Domain management

In the Service Centre, you are offered the possibility of managing your domains.
You can create subdomains and redirects. Also, can customise the DNS and the
name servers. Here we will outline the different possibilities.

Domain redirects

The redirection of a domain name to an (externally hosted) website or web
address can easily be set within the Cosmos Service
Centre. It could be the case
that you have claimed multiple domain names, for example, and want the visitors
from all different domains to immediately be redirected to the one domain under
which your website is running. Domain redirection is then the most simple way to
get your visitors where you want them to end up.

Redirecting a domain

Under the 'Hosting' tab in the Service Centre you can click 'Domain redirects'
in the bottom left-hand menu. There, under the 'Overview' tab, you can simply
insert the URL where you want the selected domain to redirect to. When entering
a URL use the format https://yourdomain.com.

Changing domain redirects

In the 'Advanced' tab you can see which domain redirects you have in place. The
redirection from the 'www.' subdomain to the primary domain is there by default.
You can change whatever redirect you have set by clicking on a URL, entering the
desired URL and saving.

Undo domain redirects

When you want to undo a domain redirect, e.g. because you built a new website,
first delete the existing domain redirects by clicking the bin icon to the left
of each of them. Then add the '@'
subdomain again under
'Subdomains' in the bottom left-hand menu. Finally, navigate to 'Domain
redirects' again, click the 'Advanced' sub tab and create the 'www' domain
redirect anew. When creating the 'www' domain redirect, fill in 'www' as the
subdomain and '@' as destination. The '@' signifies the primary domain without a
subdomain prefix (not https://subdomain.yourdomain.com but just
https://yourdomain.com).

Server alias

For multisite solutions you may want several domain names to be redirected to one
website, where the URLs originally entered in the browser by visitors do not
change. If this fits your needs, please send us
an email in which
you ask us to configure a server alias.

Subdomains

A subdomain is a domain prefix to the primary domain (for example
https://prefix.yourdomain.com). Subdomains can be useful to separate different
parts of an organisation or company, or to give an important part of the website
it's own spot.

Creating a subdomain

When logged in as the webmaster in Cosmos Service
Centre, click 'Subdomains' under
the 'Hosting' tab in the bottom left-hand menu. Then click 'Add subdomain'
to create a new subdomain. Fill in the name of the subdomain in the 'Subdomain'
field, and click create. Unless you know what you are doing, the 'Webroot' field
should be left empty.

After creation, your subdomain has been added as a separate folder next to the
DEFAULT folder on the FTP server. If the domain is registered with a different
provider, or if you are using SSL on your domain, you may need to add a separate
DNS-record for this subdomain. If you are using our name servers, this
manual shows how you can add a DNS record.

Changing subdomains

In the same overview you can see which subdomains have been created. The primary
domain is there by default, do not delete or change it. You can change whatever
subdomain you have created by clicking on a subdomain, entering the desired name
for the subdomain and saving, or you can delete a subdomain by clicking the bin
icon.

DNS records

To be able to see and use a website and the email connected to a domain name,
the internet browser needs to know where these services are being hosted. To
this end, the internet uses the DNS (Domain Name System). Within this system, a
domain name that a human types into the browser is being translated into the
associated IP address that computers use to communicate with each other. This is
very much like looking for a name in the phone book and finding the phone number
associated with that name. This
infographic
shows how the DNS works.

DNS settings in the Cosmos Service Centre

Greenhost automatically configures the DNS settings when you register a new
domain name. When the domain name registration is active, you can immediately
start using email accounts and managing a website, without making any changes to
the DNS settings. Would you like to view or change DNS settings, then log in to
the Cosmos Service Centre as webmaster. Under the 'Hosting' tab select the
intended domain name from the drop down in the upper left-hand pane and click
'DNS' in the bottom left-hand menu.

Caution : when changing DNS settings, make sure that you know what you are
doing. Changes in the DNS settings could cause the website to be unreachable for
a significant period of time.

Changing DNS settings

In the 'Overview' tab you can change the DNS settings in four different ways:

Toggle DNS off or on: in some specific cases it could be useful to stop
all traffic from and to the respective domain name. You can toggle DNS for the
respective domain off or on using the switch.

Add new record: click the blue button '+ New record' to add a new DNS
record. See below for a detailed explanation about adding a DNS record.

Delete record: to delete a DNS record, click the bin icon of the record
you want to delete, in the first column.

Modify record: you can modify existing DNS records by clicking one of the
different fields, changing the content and saving. See below under 'adding a
new DNS record' for the meaning and significance of different fields.

Adding a new DNS record

When clicking '+ New record', a drop down appears where you fill in the four
aspects of a DNS record: the Record, Type, Destination and TTL. These
aspects are described below.

Record

The record specifies for which subdomain you want to add a record. Filling in
just the name of a subdomain signifies the name of a subdomain extended by the
primary domain. (for example: 'www' results in 'www.yourdomain.com') Filling in
the '@' signifies the the primary domain name, for example 'yourdomain.com'.
Filling in the '*' signifies every other possible subdomain extended by the
primary domain name.

Type

Type includes the type of DNS reference that is made. In the drop down you can
choose one of the types:

A is the most important type, it always refers to an IP address.

CNAME refers to another domain name, never to an IP address. You can use
this type to refer subdomains to your primary domain or to an external domain
name, at DNS level.

MX 10 refers to the full domain name of a mail server, not an IP address.
The number 10 signifies the first priority reference to a email server.

MX 20 is almost the same as MX 10, but signifies the second priority
reference to a mail server,

AAAA is like A, but refers to an IPv6 address. IPv6 will in the long term
replace all normal IP traffic.

SPF refers to mail servers which are then authorised to send email for your
domain.

Destination

The destination field specifies where you want to point towards. The format this
should take depends on the type. When referring to a server or subdomain, the
rules as stated under 'Record' apply here as well. If you want to point to an
(external) server which is not under your domain, you should end your input with
a full stop. (e.g.: "mx1.greenhost.nl.")

TTL

TTL stands for Time to Live and signifies the number of seconds that this DNS
record may be kept in cache memory. The lower the TTL the faster any changes in
the record will become active for visitors or users, but after the TTL has
expired a page may load a little bit slower. Keeping this field empty results in
a default TTL of 3600 seconds (one hour), which is advised for non experienced
webmasters.

Name servers

When you register a domain at Greenhost, it is configured to use the Greenhost
name servers by default. In the Cosmos Service Centre you can easily change the
name servers for your domain.

Changing name servers

To change the name servers, log in to the Service Centre, click the 'Hosting'
tab and click 'DNS' in the bottom left-hand menu. Within 'DNS', under the
'Name servers' tab you can change the name servers in the fields by entering
their names (IP addresses are not necessary) and saving. If you change our
records it can take up to 24 hours for the changes to take effect. If you change
the name servers to those of another hosting provider or entity, their DNS
records are used for your domain name.

Please note:

If you set your domain to use other name servers and you encounter
difficulties with the DNS of your domain, it may be harder or impossible for
us to assist you.

Restoring name server settings

To restore the name server settings to the default Greenhost name servers, click
'Default values' and save. It can take up to 48 hours for this change to take
effect.